…claims the group make concerning Touch ID seem to focus on Authentec director, Robert E Grady, who appears to have been a prominent figure within the George Bush administration and (Anonymous claim) was connected with The Carlyle Group, which Anonymous also claim is a majority shareholder in Booz Allen Hamilton, the NSA contractor with which whistleblower Edward Snowden worked.

I’d like to think the government and NSA already have my fingerprints but they went out of business so NBD.

I’m a lot of Anonymous’ work, but this is totally unsubstantiated and based on crazy wild eyed conspiracy conjecture at best. Like you OP, I am also surprised that people are under the impression the Feds haven’t all of their information on file including their fingerprints for several decades now. If you think this is a new trend you probably grew up in some lily white suburban paradise where nothing bad ever happens, man.

Anonymous aren’t taking any studies on voice thats for sure. That was horrible to listen to. BTW anonymous, the US government has been collecting my fingerprints at your embassy and every time I fly to the USA. This has been going on long before Touch ID and you can’t opt to of this one.

Noooo really!? REALLY!? Is this really a shocker to anyone? Of course the NSA is getting your fingerprints through TouchID…it’s already been proven that they lied to us multiple times about data collection on American citizens, and they lied to us legally; they were legally allowed to withhold the truth from the people. On the other hand, this isn’t going to stop me from using TouchID…but it’s still good to know that Anonymous is making things aware to people that probably wouldn’t know otherwise.

Of course they will have complete access to Touch ID data. There shouldn’t be any doubt about that. Why anyone would believe Apple has the power (or even desire to) to refuse that accommodation is beyond me. You may need to brush up on reality. Those mafia thugs get what they want, and that’s the end of it.

I use Touch ID, but have no delusions about how that data is mined and databased.

I use Global Entry and Nexus when I travel, so both the US and the Canadian governments have my fingerprints plus my Iris patterns. In addition to this, when I worked in the Banking Industry I had to be bonded so again my fingerprints were used. I am not concerned.

So I’m from Illinois and was born in Missouri; both states put your entire hand and foot print on your long form birth certificate. As far as I know, this is actually the norm in most places: the government already has your fingerprints, and quite a bit more

That’s not to say that I think what Anonymous is saying is true; it’s just to say it’s slightly overblown. I’m not concerned about the government having my fingerprint since a) it can easily obtain them by following me around or just randomly arresting me and b) the people we should most be afraid of having our fingerprints are those looking to exploit them for nefarious means. That’s not to say .Gov isn’t planning on doing that, but they have SO MUCH EASIER WAYS of getting them than hacking my phone (like going to the Secretary of State Vital Records and taking them).

Snigger, and the NSA really wants the grubby fingerprints of everyone. It doesn’t guarantee that the fingerprints registered are those of the owner, it may be multiple family members, maybe a toe print here, a testicle scan there, breast print or other body bad, heck even the cats paw.

Whoever thought up this claim are a little OTT with their paranoia and obviously worried that it heralds a dawn of more use of biometrics again. Bunch of freaks.

There’s a lot of people around here who don’t have a clue as to how Touch ID actually works. Your print isn’t really stored anywhere, it’s just a hash key. All it does is say yay or nay. Apple have gotten around this whole situation of not being able to refuse (legally) by quite simply never having the data to begin with. They never have access to anything on that chip, not that there’s really anything to access on it.

By the way, does the NSA even collect things like prints? I thought that was the FBI. The NSA are data analysts.

Of course it does. Apple was EXTREMELY careful how the framed their security statements around this technology. “It never gets uploaded to the iCloud or Apple, blah” That doesn’t preclude the NSA from stealing it right out of the chip. With India trying to get everyone human in their country into a fingerprint database, America uses Fidelity owned Apple to steal it from unsuspecting citizens.